I
told them rum was coming, and ordered them to take the loads on to
Hatton and Cookson's Agent's hut and then to go and buy chop and
make themselves comfortable.
They highly approved of this plan, and
grunted assent ecstatically; and just as the loads were stowed
Holty's anatomy hove in sight with a bottle of rum under each arm,
and one in each hand; while behind him came an acolyte, a fat, small
boy, panting and puffing and doing his level best to keep up with
his long-legged flying master. I gave my men some and put the rest
in with my goods, and explained that I belonged to Hatton and
Cookson's (it's the proper thing to belong to somebody), and that
therefore I must take up my quarters at their Store; but Holty's
energetic agent hung about me like a vulture in hopes of getting
more five franc-piece pickings. I sent Ngouta off to get me some
tea, and had the hut cleared of an excited audience, and shut myself
in with Hatton and Cookson's agent, and asked him seriously and
anxiously if there was not a big factory of the firm's on the river,
because it was self-evident he had not got anything like enough
stuff to pay off my men with, and my agreement was to pay off on the
Rembwe, hence my horror at the smallness of the firm's N'dorko
store. "Besides," I said, "Mr. Glass (I knew the head Rembwe agent
of Hatton and Cookson was a Mr. Glass), you have only got cloth and
tobacco, and I have promised the Fans to pay off in whatever they
choose, and I know for sure they want powder." "I am not Mr.
Glass," said my friend; "he is up at Agonjo, I only do small trade
for him here." Joy!!!! but where's Agonjo? To make a long story
short I found Agonjo was an hour's paddle up the Rembwe and the
place we ought to have come out at. There was a botheration again
about sending up a message, because of a war palaver; but I got a
pencil note, with my letter of introduction from Mr. Cockshut to
Sanga Glass, at last delivered to that gentleman; and down he came,
in a state of considerable astonishment, not unmixed with alarm, for
no white man of any kind had been across from the Ogowe for years,
and none had ever come out at N'dorko. Mr. Glass I found an
exceedingly neat, well-educated M'pongwe gentleman in irreproachable
English garments, and with irreproachable, but slightly floreate,
English language. We started talking trade, with my band in the
middle of the street; making a patch of uproar in the moonlit
surrounding silence. As soon as we thought we had got one
gentleman's mind settled as to what goods he would take his pay in,
and were proceeding to investigate another gentleman's little
fancies, gentleman number one's mind came all to pieces again, and
he wanted "to room his bundle," i.e. change articles in it for other
articles of an equivalent value, if it must be, but of a higher, if
possible.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 169 of 371
Words from 88524 to 89059
of 194943
